Truth
by eva
Summary: Losing it all.


Title: Truth  
Author: eva  
Email: lllwickedchildlll@yahoo.com  
Summary: Losing it. Enjoy.   
Author's Note: In a Stephen King novel, a little boy (whose name might be Jake) found that he had not  
one, but two memories. He began to go insane. So that got me to thinking...   
Disclaimer: The characters in this story are the property of UPN, FOX, Mutant Enemy, and Joss... I think.  
I own only the plot.  
Feedback: Analogy- Blood : Vampires :: Feedback : Me  
  
  
  
I am slowly going insane. I feel it creeping up on me when I least expect it, when I feel as if I succeeded  
in suppressing it. Its getting harder and harder to ignore the arguing going on in my mind. Sometimes, I  
do odd, little things and not be aware of them later. I wonder a lot if people are beginning to notice my  
deteriorating mind; and try ten times harder to act as if I had not lost all my marbles. But sometimes,  
things slip. And I'm scared. It would not do to have an insane slayer, a protector with a broken mind.  
What good would I be to anyone then? Just another slayer succumbing to the pressure of a fairly hectic  
life. Swallowed by the sand of an oversized desert. Drowning and burning in boiling water. Mind being  
ripped apart... Walking down the streets of Sunnydale going absolutely crazy and thinking the oddest  
things... Hectic hectic hectic.   
  
It all started when I was brought back from the dead. It wasn't noticeable at first; my depression was far  
too great for me to feel much anything those days after. My life - or death - was robbed from me. I wanted  
it so much... to finally let it all go. The weight on my shoulders. The responsibility. I was tired. I deserved  
death. But I had some odd destiny I had to fulfill... and I guess I was not meant to die, or to be happy six  
feet under the surface of the earth and rotting. It was a bitter, bitter disappointment, but was I going to do?  
Jump off a high place and crash into the earth? Been there, done that. It was only after the suicide  
obsession that I started to lose what mind I had left.   
  
Life is suffering, and death is my gift. If only I was a robot. A mechanical thing feeling only what it was  
programmed to feel and nothing else. But would I trade having control over my feelings for living a  
loveless life? If I was going crazy (much like I am now), I probably would.   
  
It's a terrible, paranoid experience. Going crazy slowly and knowing you're losing your mind instead of  
just snap crackle pop, I'm gone. I know I am spiraling towards hell. I would glance about and wonder if  
people notice how I would space out and not return after long periods of time, thinking about my memory.  
Or my memories. 'Cause you see, I don't have one memory. I have two. And it's killing me. The suicide  
obsession just might start up again. I would be writing down a grocery list, or a note to Dawn, and then  
minutes later, look down and notice with a cold chill that I had written down "I will remember" over and  
over again, the writing thick and dark because I had pressed so hard. I would tear the incriminating paper  
up (just in case someone saw it and found out something was not right with Buffy) and tried to forget it  
ever happened. Because, at the moment, life was difficult enough. Bills to pay, Dawn to support, vampires  
to slay... It was already stressing me out, and I did not need insanity added to my list of why I should just  
die again and get it over with.   
  
(Listen to me.)  
  
I would replay my memories in my mind, every minute, every hour of the day, everything normal until I  
reach a part where my memories split into two, like a fork in the road. And I don't know which road will  
lead out of this dark maze. The point of my sanity stops when I visited LA a couple months before my  
death, when I went to confront Angel about his secret visit. One side claims I spoke to him for all of five  
minutes, and then left... And I accept this memory, I want it to be real. The other one is more terrible, and  
the same time, more marvelous. Ice cream. Contentment. Human Angel. Let's not forget human Angel.  
Making love again and again. And sunlight. It scares me, and thrills me all the same. But its also the  
cause of my madness so I really can't call it a good thing. My mind has parted from my body, separated in  
two, and started a bloody war with each other, using my head as the battlefield.   
  
(How could Angel have become human? Listen to me. It never happened. But the mohra demon. The  
blood. But it died! Angel killed it right in front of you.)  
  
My mind is at war with itself, and I feel sanity slipping through the cracks. One side screams one thing  
happened, and the other declares the other memory is truth. Its funny how I can't control my own mind.  
Funny weird, not funny ha ha. So far, I don't think anyone noticed my mental absence, the brief lapses  
between conversations, and the faraway look in my eyes I get when I think about the memory that I  
needed to be true and the other one that I wanted to be true.  
  
I really have no idea about what to do at this point. Eventually, if I don't commit suicide, I will fall into  
one of the trances I get more and more often now, and a vampire will likely take the opportunity to do in  
the slayer. I cannot tell anyone; they can't possibly understand. None of them. They'll try to help me,  
telling me which memory is more reasonable, but I have a feeling it won't help. This is bigger than me.  
It's bigger than all of us combined. They'll try reasoning with me, but my mind will continue battling  
because I cannot figure it out, and when I snap, no one can save me then. But perhaps, some one can save  
me now before it's too late. If it wasn't too late already.  
  
I take the two hour bus trip to LA during the night, leaving a message to Dawn that I checked over a few  
times to tell her I was going to be back soon. She was staying at Willow and Tara's home for the night.  
Perhaps I'll be back tonight, and she probably won't have to worry. It pains me to have to leave her, it  
scares me that she might get hurt; but the prospect of going insane and perhaps harming her myself... that  
terrifies me. The watch on my wrist ticked away, quickly filling my ears with it's loud, rhythmic sound.   
  
(It happened. It never did. What is truth? Who am I?)  
  
So I need to ask the only being in the entire world who can finally put my mind to rest. If not... well,  
there's no time to think about that. No room in my mind to think about that. I feel nothing as I sat there in  
complete silence. Feel nothing in my heart anyway. A deep black void where my love fore Angel used to  
be. Empty, empty space. But space wasn't empty, was it? It was full of stars, shining and glowing with  
brilliance... Who knew anything anymore. The ticking grew louder. Did anyone notice it's noise?   
  
Out of the corner of my eye, I see a man huddling in the corner, stealing glances my way. Probably  
wondering why I was staring into nothing like a zombie, sitting with my back so straight, it must have  
looked like I wasn't a real person. But I am. I am. (Are you? Then why is your mind torn between  
realities?) So I try to slouch a little and rest my head against the window, closing my eyes as if I was  
sleeping. I can't have people start noticing how odd I was acting. Not now. Not when I've come so far. He  
was just another faceless man on the road in life, but his eyes were watching me so closely.. as if I was  
going to reach out and snap his neck. Not I would. Would I? If I was crazy, I might. And his normal,  
fearful gaze was not helping my problem. If anything, it was making it worse. I continued to feign sleep.  
  
-tick tick tick-  
  
(He knows you're crazy. An absolute NUT. N-U-T. You know what happened that day. You know what  
you did. Living breathing Angel. Did him again and again. Admit it. No. But wait. Wait. Nothing  
happened. There's a curse. There's no happiness for you. For him. No normal life. No normal death. Not  
even a normal resurrection, if resurrection can be considered normal...)  
  
I stepped off the bus, forgetting for a moment why exactly was I there. When did I get here? Something...  
something... -tick tick tick-  
  
(It never happened. It's impossible for you to have held your hand over Angel's chest and felt a heart beat.  
It was just a wonderful, terrible dream...)  
  
Shut up! Shut up! I can't hear over the noise. There was a purpose.. for coming here... Where am I? What  
the hell am I doing here? It comes to me slowly, like a person waking from a sleep, beauty woken by  
prince charming, rescued after being underwater for so long. The cloud in my mind passes briefly. LA. I  
am in LA. City of Angels. Angel. I need to get to him now. Months ago. His home. I hurry past the man  
who had gotten off the bus with me, and I notice he cringes ever so slightly, trying to keep his distance.  
As if I was going to hurt him. As if I was crazy. Was I letting it show? Did he hear the so loud ticking?  
  
I begin to run.  
  
I pounded on the door of the Hyperion Hotel. I run over why I was here over and over again, to make sure  
when (give in) he opened the door, I wouldn't be a raving lunatic without rhyme or reason. It's gotten  
worse so fast. It was preying one you. On me. The ticking and the voices and the arguing. -tick tick tick  
tick- Heaven forbid he sees me broken down like this. I pound and pound harder and harder faster and  
faster shut up slipping away so quickly. dawn is coming. remember I'll never forget did it happen did it for  
you that's all there istosayI'llneverforgetI'llneverforgetI'llneverforget -   
  
___________  
  
When the only being who knew all the true answers opened the door, knowing who it was pounding at the  
door and this hour (slaying slime demons for most of the night had taken it's toll) and yet not knowing at  
all, he was stunned to find the woman whom he used to believe was everything clinging tightly to his  
neck, sobbing and mumbling the last words he heard when he was human. It happened quickly and was a  
shock to the lovers - for they were still lovers, even thought there were still obstacles. In that one  
significant instant in time, he saved her life, her sanity, without being aware of it. Because the moment  
they touched, the moment he responded to her embrace, she has her first untortured thought in what  
seemed like an eternity: This is the only truth.  
  



End file.
